2017/18 Premier League & General Football Discussion

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Can you think of a more Liverpool thing to do that to win against the league leaders only to go and lose to the bottom placed team a week later?
 
As if this night could get any more better! :D:D

How the hell we won that ill never know, but a massive effort from everyone especially Alfie Mawson who was immense, what a win!

West Ham in 11th place have 26 points, Swansea-who remain 20th-now have 20 points. There is just 6 points separating the bottom half, its that tight!
 
Like you just said, classic Liverpool move to beat the "invincibles" then to lose to 20th Swansea :lol:
 
Not strictly Premier League but hoping for a few of you to be Bristol City fans tonight.

I thought the Man Utd game last month was the biggest City game of my lifetime, but that is going to be eclipsed by tonight. Cannot wait!
 
Bristol City v Man City tonight and Arsenal v Chelsea tomorrow in the League Cup semi final second legs, Man City have a narrow 2-1 lead and Arsenal Chelsea is 0-0, tonight's game should be very interesting!

Man City reportedly in talks to sign Laporte from Bilbao for £60 million.

Phil Neville appointed England Women head coach.
 
The day after Liverpool strike force misfired badly, David N'Gog picked up on a free by Ross County, as an LFC fan I appreciated his cunning finishes from six inches.
Found his 19 goals for Pool in between 81 from Torres and 82 from Suarez. Let me see how many Peter Crouch managed next :lol:

 
Well a City did make it to the League Cup final tonight, but its of the Manchester variety and not Bristol, they won 2-3 tonight and go through 3-5 on aggregate, full credit to Lee Johnson and Bristol for the fight they put up over the two games though, they were immense. 👍
 


V0l2ZSW.gif
Jimlaad43
It's a tournament designed to
Click to expand...
... increase the FIFA world ranking points of UEFA nations.
 
"Graphic design is my passion."
 
I thought the new Leeds badge thing was a joke at first, it's that awful and as with most recent things to do with UEFA or FIFA the Nations League rubbish will make match fixing and getting (insert team here) to succeed so much easier and much more lucrative too if you are a rigger.
 
Germany, France and Netherlands in the same group though!

Phil Neville in a lot of hot water today over some sexist tweets he posted back in 2011 and 2012, it especially looks bad on the FA once again as they decided not to punish him, it was a weird move anyway to put someone in charge of a senior Women's Football team without the person having any experience in management let alone Women's Football but those tweets make the decision a lot worse.
 
You know what badge those 10,000 should've come up with?

Leeds_United_Logo.png


Was there really any need to change it?

Also that Nations League thing is fine. Gives meaning to the previously meaningless.
 
C-ZETA
Also that Nations League thing is fine. Gives meaning to the previously meaningless.
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It's more that it gives unwarranted meaning to it.

The way FIFA rankings work is that a match result is multiplied by a whole load of things, like the difference in ranking between the teams and the relative strength of the confederation. Lose a match and you get no points. Win one and you could get 1,500. A country's score is averaged across the year, then added to the previous three years of results - with older years weighted less (20% for 3-4 years, 30% for 2-3 years, 50% for 1-2 years). Germany is currently #1 and has a score of 1,600ish (863, 752 (376), 478 (143), 1090 (218)).


FIFA Rankings also include a match status multiplier. This is 4x for World Cup Finals games, 3x for Confederations Cup Finals games and continental championship finals (like UEFA Euro 2020, or the African Cup of Nations), 2.5x for qualifiers for World Cup and continental championships, and 1x for friendly games.

Right now, every nation in every confederation has one set of continental qualifiers and one set of World Cup qualifiers every four years. UEFA nations, no matter how small, already have a guaranteed minimum of 20 of these 2.5x score games, while others have just 4 (Asian and African nations have a preliminary knock-out stage; head-to-head home and away).

In the two years where they don't have continental qualifiers, they play friendlies. Little teams love friendlies, because they get to play big teams and if the big teams are experimenting with line-ups they might nick a draw. A friendly draw with a big team is worth 200pt to a small team, increasing their ranking score. But even a friendly victory for a big team is worth only 600pt at most (597, I think, if the world #1 team beats the world #2 and both are in CONMEBOL), reducing their ranking score.

Big teams hate friendlies - as do teams trying to become big ones. Wales went a year without playing a friendly specifically for this reason, and it resulted in their ranking improving to get more favorable draws for Euro 2016 and WC 2018 qualifiers, and their first finals event in bloody ages (nearly made two in a row too).


Now here comes the Nations League. UEFA teams now have no seasons without qualifiers of some kind. The big UEFA teams don't have to play friendlies any more, so there's no risk of their points falling. Nations League is a confederation level event, with a 2.5x multiplier, so every game is 2.5 times more worthwhile to them than any friendly. This preserves their ranking - even increases it for some of the middling UEFA teams.

Without the big teams to play, who are the little teams going to play? Yep, each other. But even a friendly win for a little team against another one doesn't compare to a friendly draw with a big one, so their rankings will go down as a result of not being able to play UEFA teams.

Basically this is bad for world football.


Oh, also UEFA has said that this simplifies the process for Euro Championship qualification. Quick reminder, this is the current version:
10 groups; Winners and runners-up qualify
8 best 3rd place teams seeded by FIFA ranking and drawn in two-leg knockout for final four places

Here's the new version:
10 groups; Winners and runners-up qualify
16 teams from Nations League play each other in playoffs;
- 16 group winners are selected;
-- If a group winner has already qualified, the next best team from the league (not group) is selected;
--- If all teams from a league have already qualified, the next best team from the next league (not group) is selected
- 4 play-off paths;
-- Each path uses four teams from the same league;
--- If more than four teams from the same league have qualified, a draw is held to determine which plays in which path
- Seeded playoffs (1st vs 4th; 2nd vs 3rd) in two-legged semi final
- 4 single-leg final winners qualify


Simple!
 
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Arsenal beat Chelsea 2-1 on aggregate to face Man City in the EFL Cup final.

Real Madrid's season just got worse after being dumped out of the Copa Del Rey by Leganes at home tonight, they are outside the top four in La Liga miles behind Barcelona.
 
MUSC4EVER
Real Madrid's season just got worse after being dumped out of the Copa Del Rey by Leganes at home tonight, they are outside the top four in La Liga miles behind Barcelona.
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While it's an utterly embarrassing result, it's probably for the better for Real.

Only La Liga and Champions League to focus on for the rest of the season.

Need that 2nd half of the season finish like they have shown some years now.
 
Mourinho signs contract extension at Man United until 2020 with an option for a further year.
 
I'm quite happy with the way things are going right now, I feel like we are improving and that he is improving the team, we cant catch City this season but ill be happy with second place considering we were sixth last season and if we have a good Summer window then we can make a proper go of the title next season
 
Games this weekend.

Err......there aren't any Premier League games as its the FA Cup fourth round, there are PL games in midweek next week so normal service will resume then.
 
Premier League games for Tuesday and Wednesday night.

Tuesday night
Huddersfield v Liverpool (8pm BT)
Swansea v Arsenal
West Ham v Crystal Palace

Wednesday night
Chelsea v Bournemouth
Everton v Leicester
Man City v West Brom (8pm)
Newcastle v Burnley
Southampton v Brighton
Stoke v Watford (8pm)
Tottenham v Man United (8pm BT)

Stoke v Watford is a massive game at the bottom where it is very tight. So is West Ham v Palace.

Reports saying that Arsenal have agreed a deal in principle with Dortmund for Aubumeyang.

January transfer window closes at 11pm on Wednesday.
 
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